Parvo cases

Re: Parvo cases

Karen Vernon — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 05:40:43 GMT

I work in Australia, and as you, I've seen too many too.

We also use what you have, medication wise. I have seen the plasma infusion used and I think it did a good job, though pricey!

A good mention of the photo scare tactic. I think I will keep that I'm mind as parvo season is upon us here.

Re: Parvo cases

FionaA — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 00:12:20 GMT

I am probably very fortuate to have worked in practice for nearly 10 years and can count the parvo puppies I have seen on one hand. However the case of parvo that I remember were 2 dalmation puppies who were bought out of the back of a car; they had been driven from Ireland with various different puppies and kittens and were being sold for £50.

This was my first year of nursing and I remember keeping their fluids going and the constant cleaning that they needed but they did survive. However the first pup died at about 4 years old after having liver problems for most of its life. The other pup was PTS at about 9 after suffering from epilepsy, he also had GI problems most of his life. The problems could have been because of poor breeding or because of the parvo? How many cases of parvo are followed up?

Re: Parvo cases

Jeniflower — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 14:08:13 GMT

Unfortunately I've seen too many of these cases too.

Medication wise- metronidazole, ranitidine, cerenia (until V-), buprenorphine. Also K+ added to IVFT regime. I think we may have used sucralfate as well once Vomitting had stopped and we were encouraging feeding again. - some literature advocates plasma infusions where necessary but I haven't seen this utilised yet.

I always feel so bad because they need so much TLC, yet time and isolation dictates that you don't actually get much time with them.

We got so disheartened seeing cases in our last place that we took a photo (with O' permission) of a case that had died with us and used it in the waiting room to help educate our clients. Bit of a scare tactic.

At one point we kept getting one client (breeder) who brought a dog practically every week to us with parvo- I remember discharging one of them too him and his response was- "oh thought he'd die, I've just bought another one from Ebay. "- did he vaccinate this one... nope.

Re: Parvo cases

fiona eldridge — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 12:52:12 GMT

Our parvo cases have calmed a lot now. We used to have lots and lots of pet shop bought puppies (Spain..... puppy farmed from all over..Czech Republic and alsorts) we think they all came on the same truck and get spread among the pet shops on the coast here. If the very new owners allowed then we had a good success rate with i/v fluids, Virbagen Interferon, and feeding as soon as we could. Only if they were really tiny (chihuahuas were the worst) did we get fatalities. Most pulled through with this treatment. Quite surprised me, as i was always educated that parvo=death. Not so anymore!

Luckily the amount of puppies bought in these pet shops has decreased dramatically.

Re: Parvo cases

Wispa — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 22:33:01 GMT

I work in a charity practice, and we must see in excess of 50 parvo's per year, at least. most of them are confirmed as we do parvo snap tests. our success rate is pretty good, if they are caught early enough. our usual treatment regime is:

IV fluids - 2-3xmaint rate to replace fluids lost through vomiting and diarrhoea.

meds: synulox and metronidazole as AB cover, zantac, buprenorphine and cerenia. we will also use a metoclopramide infusion.

we like to encourage feeding a ssoon as possible, so we will place an NG/OG tube depending on the dog size, or just syringe feed to help prevent bacterial translocation within the intestines.

often they are in for about a week. thr most we have had in at one time was 6 husky puppies. we managed to save 4 of them.

Re: Parvo cases

Sal the 1st — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 22:12:39 GMT

When I worked in charity practice we were inundated with parvo cases ( tho I do sometimes think that 'parvo' wasnt always parvo and anything that had BDV was automatically called parvo - ie a dog that had been on daily finadyne tablets for 2 weeks with horrendous BDV ) for the 10yrs+ I worked there I cannot remember the isolation area ever being empty. we used loads of i/v fluids, emequell (metoclopramide) as it was then i/v metronidazole and sometimes augmentin - I remember we were given some freebie virbagen but TBH on the cases we were using it on it made negligible difference. If you could get them to stage where they were keeping lectade down we also used antepsin which seemed to help a little. We had a recovery rate of about 70%. We were so busy with these cases at one bit that we were running parvo clinics where dogs were sat in a clinic with their owners basically until a bag of fluid or however much they needed was run through, and then they went home to return the next day for a repeat.

Worst case I have seen in in practice outside the charity was a breeder of white GSDs - and I think in the finish he lost the lot (around 20 dogs)

Re: Parvo cases

Nicola Smith — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 21:16:56 GMT

We fi nd cerenia pretty good for stopping the vomiting. Even if they dont keep it down still good to feed - tube feed if nec as it does help recovery, we also use glutalyte due to the glutamine in it which we were advised to do by a medicine vet at one of the uni's I think.

Iv antibiotics seen metronidazole used most often I think. Beware on using baytril in puppies as not meant to use in growing dogs but seen it used in older dogs for parvo.

Re: Parvo cases

Ilovehorses — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 15:29:40 GMT

Which I/v antibiotics? And how do you feel with the feeding, I've always found they just vomit so much even with anti-emetics it's not fair. We see alot too and was just interested to see what others do really xx

Re: Parvo cases

A-J — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 13:20:07 GMT

loads so many lost count if i'm honest. I work in an ooh clinic but based at a charity hospital. Loads of unvaccinated dogs. We had a really bad time of it in 2010 and survival rate was 50/50. Have had fewer this year but still alot.

Intensive ivft, iv ab's, anti emetics and trying to feed them too. Very sad nursing them as need so much time but in an ooh setting that can sometimes be hard as minimal staff.

Plan to register for the webinar tonight :-)

Re: Parvo cases

hobbits — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 10:41:02 GMT

If you are interested in learning more about nursing parvo then we are holding a webinar tonight with Kath Howie VTS VN lecturing. Go to the cpd diary on here or www.triplehveterinarynursecpd.co.uk for more info.

Re: Parvo cases

Nicola Smith — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 09:31:40 GMT

We had a bad time autumn 3 years ago. Big outbreak on bredder premises - 22 pups in total I think, we lost about 7 - there were 3 litters and think most of mortalities from oldest litter who were about 11weeks old. What we could do was very restricted by money so only iv fluids and supportive care - not able to use virbagen or similar. We then the following week had a staffie in about 1 year old had been vacc'd at neighbouring practice - he recovered fine as wasnt nearly as poorly, followed by a 5month old husky vaccd at neighbouring practice was very poorly and died within 2 days despite everything. We then had an adult boxer from a boarding kennels who hadnt bothered to ask for proof of vaccination and were also running a rescue from the same premises - o elected not to even try to treat it even though not that sick and prob would have been fine. All this happened over about 6 months.

Then last year we had another breeder had an outbreak - we only saw 2 of her dogs - she declined iv fluids etc on the one and took it home to nurse and died, other one a JRT had iv fluids and was fine very quickly. She tok the others to a neighbouring practice but unsure on numbers or mortalities - and never paid her bill to either practice!!!

So I do think we are quite a hot spot round here. We recomend 3rd parvo vaccs and do get a good uptake and fingers crossed none of our own have ever come down with it all the vaccinated ones have been from neighbouring practices. All the cases above except the boxer and jrt that died were in house tested then had PCR testing for type and all came back 2b, boxer and jrt were in house elisa test but also clinical picture fitted and as they had not been vaccinated pretty sure on diagnosis despote not sending off for PCR.

Re: Parvo cases

Phrin Vernon RVN — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 23:59:31 GMT

In the last couple of years I have seen 'one' parvo case - it was a litter of pups from a backyard lurcher breeder - I think there were 5 or 6 of them. We nursed them intensively, had them in iso etc... I don't recall any surviving...

Can't remember us getting paid either.....

A person by the same name as the client is always asking for puppies and ferrets on our local freecycle group..... not that there is any connection of course

Re: Parvo cases

Gemma Burden RVN — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 22:43:31 GMT

In the nine years I have been nursing I have only seen one confirmed parvo case, and that was in my first year of nursing. It was five puppies that had been dumped in a box in the middle of the summer and also had heat stroke. Unfortunately it is too long ago for me to remember what we did, but I do remember the outcome. One puppy went back to the RSPCA the day after they were admitted, but I am not convinced he was from the same litter as looked very different to the other pups and was nowhere near as unwell. Over the next two weeks all but one puppy died or had to be put down. I think we are lucky in the area I work, it is a fairly affluent area and most people do look after their dogs well, and we don't have a lot of strays, so I think that helps with keeping the number of cases locally relatively low.